Motorheads (new course) 11-16 Fridays 10-12pm

Booking

This activity is all about motors and what they do - mainly the internal combustion engine and associated machinery such as gearboxes, mechanical systems typically in cars and garden machinery.

Lawn mowers are very accessible, usable and can be repaired. They are often neglected in damp sheds and when they stop working people buy something new and donate them to someone who knows how to fix them. Thankfully the availability of electrical and fuel related parts is on the increase so many mowers can be easy to fix, as long as we diagnose the fault in a methodical way. This is what we do - methodology. We have a small fleet of ride-on mowers donated for the purposes of education which can be taken apart, reassembled and run. The technology is applicable to go-karts, motorbikes and cars. Whilst electric motors have replaced IC (internal combustion) in a handful of applications the IC engine has a promising future particularly where research is revealing fuels less toxic to the environment, ever more energy efficient and having a lower ecological and humanitarian footprint than batteries. A number of motor companies have begun developing IC engines again for its benefits. Anyway, politics aside these methodological skills are going to be valuable for the foreseeable future in any device that is powered by an IC motor.

The 'buggy' is based on a Mini Metro. Built into a space frame with four point harnesses it has seen some life - but for us its a great way of understanding the basic systems of a road vehicle without the external packaging. We'll be stripping down the various systems - brakes and steering to make sure it's all in good health. All good skills.